Newswise — The American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) today introduced APG-I, a new online portal to its Occupational Medicine Practice Guidelines that will speed access to decision-making information that is based on the most current comparative research. The new online tool provides a decision-support system that allows unprecedented navigation through ACOEM's evidence-based Practice Guidelines with intuitive, user-friendly infrastructure and high-speed performance.
Developed in tandem with global evidence-based information-technology leader Indico Solutions and medical-disability experts at The Reed Group, the new system uses Indico's powerful web-based infrastructure, which allows a significantly improved end-user experience, guideline development environment and greater options for third party integrators. This partnership will enable ACOEM to deliver its guidelines through a wide range of platforms, including electronic libraries, practice-management and electronic medical record systems.
"When combined with our guidelines, APG-I creates a package for users that we believe offers them the best of all worlds: high quality, truly evidenced-based guidelines and speed of access, efficiency and ease of use," said ACOEM President Robert R. Orford, MD. "ACOEM is fully committed to leveraging technology to make our user experience the best it can be, and we view this as the beginning of a new era for our guidelines."
In addition to complete access to the 2008 revision of ACOEM's Occupational Medical Practice Guidelines Second Edition, APG-I offers web-services support that allows third-party developers to integrate content with electronic medical records and other emerging health-related online applications. The new portal also provides easy-to-use infrastructure tools for guidelines developers, allowing them to coordinate and rank literature and panel operations.
"This product represents a new direction in online disability management," said Jon Seymour, MD, President of Reed Group Guidelines. "This system delivers the powerful web capabilities that the occupational medicine, workers' compensation, and disability management communities need. APG-I forms a new cornerstone of our development projects and we're very excited to be collaborating with ACOEM on new applications of this great system in the future."
All of ACOEM's guideline content, which totals almost 1,200 pages in its latest revision, is available through the APG-I portal. The recently released 2008 edition includes hundreds of new treatment recommendations for workplace injuries and diseases. New chapters on injuries of the elbow and lower back are included in the new edition, as well as new guidelines for the treatment of chronic pain. The new guidelines are based on an improved methodology, which focuses on grading and multi-disciplinary, expert review of original research and includes significantly expanded references to medical literature. The new chronic pain chapter, for example, features 1,500 medical references, including evidence from 546 randomized controlled trials.
First published in 1997, Occupational Medicine Practice Guidelines has become the leading source in the United States for evidence-based guidelines used by occupational physicians and other healthcare professionals. ACOEM's guidelines are also used extensively by insurers, employers, attorneys, and other individuals and organizations involved in health and safety in the workplace.
ACOEM's Practice Guidelines are considered the gold standard in effective treatment of occupational injuries and illnesses, helping to improve or restore the health of workers through identification of the most efficacious treatment strategies to be implemented at the earliest date. ACOEM's Practice Guidelines are the only quality evidence-based guidelines that focus returning injured or ill workers to functional life and work within 90 days of an injury or illness.
The use of guidelines continues to grow in the United States as a means of improving medical outcomes. The federal government recently approved $1.1 billion in funding for what it calls "comparative effectiveness research" " essentially the study of different treatments for the same illness to determine what provides the best results. ACOEM guidelines utilize such studies in determining best practices for physicians.
New individual users may subscribe to APG-I by visiting www.acoem.org or calling 847-818-1800; corporate customers or group accounts call Reed Group at 800-441-9628.
The 2008 Second Edition of Occupational Medicine Practice Guidelines was edited by Kurt T. Hegmann, MD, The 2004 Second Edition was edited by Lee S. Glass, MD. Contributing editors include Bernard Blais, MD; Elizabeth Genovese, MD; Michael Goertz, MD; Jeffrey Harris, MD; Harold Hoffman, MD; Julia Klees, MD; and C. David Rowlett, MD.
About ACOEMThe American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) represents nearly 5,000 physicians specializing in occupational and environmental medicine. Founded in 1916, ACOEM is the nation's largest medical society dedicated to promoting the health of workers through preventive medicine, clinical care, disability management, research, and education. For more information, visit www.acoem.org.
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